


High on loving you

by eclipseraider



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, pricefield
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:29:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27893866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eclipseraider/pseuds/eclipseraider
Summary: David is surprised when Chloe suddenly stops smoking. Pricefield with slight AU. One-shot.
Relationships: Maxine "Max" Caulfield/Chloe Price
Comments: 1
Kudos: 46





	High on loving you

**Author's Note:**

> This is a complete rewrite of a fic with the same title. I wasn't happy with the direction it took so I had another shot. This feels more organic.

The first time David caught Chloe getting high, she was sixteen, and taking a deep breath from a doobie while sitting on the hood of his car. He gave her a real dressing down, and in return, she gave him attitude with interest.

He didn't appreciate that kind of behavior. And as an army vet, there was no way he would let her get away with it. Not without some kind of disciplinary action.

That's how Chloe wound up getting a part-time job at the nearest Goodwill. 

To say she hated it would be putting it mildly.

Chloe didn't really feel much ever since her Dad died. Apart from hatred and anger, of course. Her emotions were like ghosts. 

Oh she'd get flashbacks alright, weak reminders of things she used to laugh at, the dumb stuff she'd get up to with her ex-best friend, almost like déjà vu. But never full strength happiness.

She'd ripped all the childhood posters off her wall and replaced them with rock bands, and painted over the positive quotes with angry graffiti. 

She thought if she destroyed everything that reminded her of William, she might be ok again. Life might feel worth it again.

But every day still felt the same: pointless.

So when she went to a skeevy party in some back alley club, and some guy on the dancefloor offered her a joint, said it would take away her pain, she said, "What the hell."

William would've been disappointed.

Max would have been even more disappointed, but try not to show it.

Chloe didn't care.

She felt good for the first time in months.

The second time David caught Chloe getting high, she wasn't doing it alone.

They were in Chloe's bed, listening to teenage crap, and sitting a bit too close.

Her accomplice, Rachel, was a pretty little thing, but David hated the fact she was enabling Chloe. 

So he yelled at the both of them until he was red in the face. Then he burned their pot, and kicked them out of the house.

When Joyce found out, she was furious, but more with David than with Chloe. 

They had a big fight, but David loved Joyce, and even though he was fed up with Chloe's bullshit, he begrudgingly went to pick her up from the junkyard at Joyce's request. They argued the entire ride home, and to nobody's surprise, Chloe won every argument.

Chloe was good at talking back to adults. She liked that about herself, that nobody could push her around. Apart from Rachel, maybe.

She liked Rachel a lot. In the fucked up desert that was Arcadia Bay, Rachel Amber was an oasis. Her oasis. 

Their first kiss was underneath the streetlamps on a balmy night.

When Rachel tilted her face, kissing deeper, and stroked her cheek like that, her heartbeat went a little crazy.

Chloe knew she liked girls for sure then. 

So Chloe didn't mind it when Rachel would turn up at the Goodwill and distract her from work. But her manager did. She'd endured three months in that hellhole so being fired was a miracle. 

Rachel laughed, hand linked with Chloe's as they leaned into each other, sitting in their favorite spot in the junkyard. There was so much crap in this place. But it was theirs. Chloe inhaled the smoke from Rachel's recent acquisition, a bong from Frankie B, and everything was good again. Everything was perfect. 

The third time David caught Chloe getting high, she was in the girls' bathroom at school, and she had blown too many chances.

But he didn't yell at her. 

He just took her to Principal Wells' office, and explained what had happened. 

She was expelled that same afternoon.

Chloe wanted to hate him even more, she really did, but she kind of saw it as a favor. An unintentional one, but still a favor. 10 points for step-dick.

Joyce was waiting at the Blackwell parking lot, arms folded firmly.

Chloe could tell she was upset. Unlike some of the other kids here, Chloe was on a scholarship, and this was basically the equivalent of throwing it down the drain.

She just wished she could care.

Chloe stared out the window, noticing the tiny droplets that would occasionally trickle down the glass. She hadn't cried since that day. Max had recorded a message on her tape recorder, and she'd listened to it, and she'd hoped that if she clung to the recorder tightly enough, she'd wake up from the nightmare.

She'd written a bunch of letters to Max, but only in a journal. There was no point in sending them if she was never going to get a reply, right? Who cares. Max was in the past. She had Rachel now.

It still hurt Chloe when Joyce didn't speak to her for a week. Somehow, that was worse than arguing.

The fourth time David caught Chloe getting high, she was on the couch, the TV was on, and she was crying.

When he asked her what was wrong, she told him to fuck off and marched up to her room.

Later that evening, Joyce let it slip that Rachel had up and vanished with no explanation, and that she hadn't seen Chloe so down in a long, long time. Joyce knew Chloe liked to keep to herself when it came to these things. It was the same when William died. She went right into her shell and refused to come out, no matter how much Joyce prodded.

Her bond with Rachel had been different. Joyce could tell. Chloe was always affectionate as a girl, and although William thought nothing of it, Joyce knew better. She noticed the way Chloe would look at Max sometimes, just a little bit too long, and one night, when Max was sleeping over, she was going to check on them one last time, but she stopped herself at the door when she saw Chloe trying to kiss her. 

Joyce never spoke about it with Chloe. If her daughter ever felt like bringing it up, she would do so in her own time. And her Mom would support her when she did. 

And if things ever went south, and a girl broke Chloe's heart, like today, Joyce knew the remedy. 

She did what she always did. She fried up some burgers, wrapped them all fancy like she did at the diner, and dropped them outside Chloe's door. Then she knocked a few times and let her daughter know there was food if she wanted some. 

In a rare act of charity, but probably more due to Joyce's insistence, David decided against scolding Chloe. Just this once.

The fifth time David caught Chloe getting high, she was in her room, and a short girl with freckles came bundling out of the closet to leap to her defense.

Chloe was surprised, not just because Max took the blame, but because of how willing she was to do it. Having a friend again felt kind of awesome. 

Later on, when they were at the lighthouse, just gazing into the sunset, Max took her picture. When Chloe asked why, Max just said the glow made her face look pretty, and Chloe didn't know how to respond.

The next time they hooked up, Chloe had sort of but not completely forgiven her for bailing, and they were lying on their backs, floating in the the Blackwell swimming pool. They were breaking a ton of rules, but Chloe felt it was more exciting this way. 

Max splashed her, and Chloe splashed back, and she felt her heart skip a beat.

She wondered, very briefly, what would happen if she put her arms around Max's waist and pulled her into a kiss. Would Max kiss her back? Would she push her off, and say she was only interested in boys? 

She'd picked the girls' changing room before. 

Was Max giving her a sign?

She never did push her away that time they were kids. Then again, they also never spoke about it afterwards because according to Max, the pirate code said best friends weren't supposed to kiss. 

But that was five years ago. 

Chloe decided to test the waters, and made some offhanded comment about Max being cute, but it was instantly deflected. She'd have to up her game if she wanted real answers.

She convinced Max to stay over her house, and they lay down next to each other on Chloe's weed-soaked bed, a bit too much distance between them. Chloe sighed and grabbed Max's arm, reeling her in so their bodies were just lightly touching. If Max had any problems with that, she didn't say so. She just looked up at her, an unreadable expression on her face, and wished her a goodnight.

The next morning, Chloe felt it: desperation. If she didn't do something to express her feelings, she was legitimately going to push Max down onto the bed and kiss her until she lost her breath.

So she double-dared Max to kiss her, and Max did.

Chloe didn't expect it to feel the way it did. It felt like the neural circuits in her brain had short circuited or possibly even overloaded, so she pulled away, like she'd been zapped by electricity. 

Kissing Max felt a lot like getting high, but much, much better, and if she did it again, Chloe knew she probably wouldn't be able to stop. 

But when they broke into Frank's RV, and found suggestive photos of Rachel, found love letters she had written to him and not Chloe, Chloe was livid.

She felt like tearing every fucking photo with her and Rachel in it. 

She felt like barging into the diner and punching Frank in his ugly ass face.

She felt like getting high.

So Chloe drove Max back to her dorm. The ride was tense, and Chloe was like a sniper, shooting down any logic that would dare to leave Max's lips. There was no time for that now. Not when her girlfriend had been fucking her dealer, and not when her ex-BFF who she was crushing on was trying to psychoanalyze her.

Fuck all that. Fuck all of that.

Chloe stormed out of her truck, and made a beeline for the junkyard hideout. Even thinking about Frank touching Rachel made her feel like puking. 

And right now, she hated Rachel for not telling her, probably as much as she hated Frank.

Chloe picked up one of the bottles strewn about the room and smashed it. Her foot connected hard with the drawers, leaving a noticeable dent, and then she screamed, at the top of her lungs, to nobody, about how fucked up her life was.

But she didn't cry.

Instead, she pulled out a spare blunt she'd hidden for a rainy day, lit it and raised it to her lips, ready to take a puff and be done with everything.

The moment she did, she heard Max's voice in her head. She heard the sweetness, the fear, and the longing. She heard Max plead with her, begging her to see that she cared, and that she needed her, she needed Chloe in her life.

Chloe scowled. 

She let the blunt drop to the floor and stamped it out.

Her feet took her to Blackwell.

She was still mad. Seething, in fact. When she broke into the girls' dorm, that bitch Victoria Chase was walking to the bathroom, and gaped when she saw her, so Chloe told her to go fuck herself with her tiara.

Kari Price 1, Victoria Chase 0.

Chloe knocked on Max's door, impatiently.

The fourth time, Max answered, and gasped when Chloe grabbed her face and smashed their lips together, banging the door shut behind them.

Max kissed her back, sensual and slow, and let Chloe guide her backwards until they hit her bed and felt Chloe fall on top of her like they were always meant to be together.

She threaded her fingers through Chloe's hair, and Chloe deepened the kiss, her tongue tasting the interiors of Max's mouth for the first time. Max inhaled sharply as Chloe's hand trailed south, over the swell of her breasts, and began toying with her waistband.

She grabbed her hand suddenly, eyes wide, and Chloe frowned at the interruption, but she smiled when Max shout-whispered "Curtains!" into her ear.

David never caught Chloe getting high ever again.


End file.
